Typhoon Haiyan Leaves Humanitarian Crisis in the Phillippines: VIDEO

As Monday dawned, it became increasingly clear that Typhoon Haiyan had ravaged cities, towns and fishing villages when it played a deadly form of hopscotch across the islands of the central Philippines on Friday. By some estimates, at least 10,000 people may have died in Tacloban alone, and with phone service out across stretches of the far-flung archipelago, it was difficult to know if the storm was as deadly in more remote areas.

President Benigno Aquino, facing one of the biggest challenges of his three-year rule, deployed soldiers to the devastated city of Tacloban to quell looting and said he might impose martial law or a state of emergency to ensure security.

Super typhoon Haiyan destroyed about 70 to 80 percent of structures in its path as it tore through Leyte province on Friday, said police chief superintendent Elmer Soria. After weakening, the storm headed west towards Vietnam.

Huge waves from one of the strongest storms ever recorded swept away coastal villages. Some officials likened the destruction to the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami.

Given the comparatively innovative track record of THIS pope and the long standing importance of the Philippines to the Catholic Church I would bet that FRANCIS has already ordered the plane. Fear that this is just one of many to come . . .

Posted by: Mike | Nov 11, 2013 8:19:12 AM

If we don't start reducing greenhouse gasses soon, this is what the Gulf Coast states or the east coast may look like soon. Heat is going into the oceans now, much moreso than in the atmosphere, and warmer oceans mean more deadlier, stronger storms. Once the oceans really warm, there will be nothing we can do about it. We must take action soon.